Treatise Challenges Society To Defend, Nurture Marriage

June 30, 2000|By Steve Kloehn.

If it's June, it must be the Presbyterians' turn to fight about homosexuality. The Methodists did it in May; next month it will be the Episcopalians. But Friday, in Long Beach, Calif., the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. will hold its annual debate, this time voting on a prohibition of same-sex unions.

A prediction: The fight will be fierce, exhausting and utterly inconclusive. Its lasting achievement will be to lay the groundwork for another fight over homosexuality next year.

Another prediction: Scant attention will be paid to the battle's underlying issue--marriage.

The basis of religious opposition to homosexuality is not an arbitrary and isolated objection to same-sex gratification. Homosexuality is set against the norm found in scriptures and natural law philosophy: marriage between a man and woman, with procreation and the successful rearing of children as one of its main ends.

And though other factors are certainly at work, it would not stretch credulity to suggest that homosexuality has become the line in the sand for mainline Protestants precisely because marriage and family have become such shaky institutions, in dire need of defense.

So, although the Presbyterian vote will get its headlines, the more intriguing event of the week was the release Thursday in Denver of a bracing declaration called "The Marriage Movement: A Statement of Principles."

The 25-page document is signed by an ad hoc group of 100 scholars, activists, social workers and politicians. Some are religious, some agnostic or atheist, some conservative, some liberal.

The signers range from African-American church scholar and seminary president Robert Franklin to author and Oprah gabster Robert Bellah; from Rabbi Marc Gellman, president of the New York Board of Rabbis, to conservative Catholic legal scholar Mary Ann Glendon of Harvard.

Preparation of the statement was sponsored in part by the University of Chicago Divinity School's Religion, Culture and Family Project, and the document has the backing of two of the university's most insightful and influential scholars of culture, Don Browning and Jean Bethke Elshtain.

"The Marriage Movement: A Statement of Principles" argues that traditional, lifelong marriages and the families they create are crucially important to the people in them and society as a whole. Moreover, the institution of marriage can be revived, the authors insist.

That may sound obvious to some people, laughable to others. But the authors refuse to take for granted either the cultural hegemony of marriage in past generations or the blithe cynicism of today's culture. And with 92 footnotes, they pack in plenty of empirical evidence to support their strong words.

"We come together because the divorce revolution has failed. Contrary to the hopes of many Americans in the 1970s, high divorce rates have proved no panacea for family dysfunction," the statement declares.

"When marriages fail, children suffer. ... We firmly believe that every family raising children deserves respect and support. Yet at the same time, we cannot forget that not every family form is equally likely to protect children's well-being.

"Nor has the divorce revolution reliably delivered on its promise to adults of greater personal happiness," it continues.

If that were not enough, the statement goes on to point out that the decline of marriage has done a great deal to spread the kinds of social and economic inequalities that bedevil the nation even in the midst of unprecedented prosperity. Those who suffer the most are children, women, the poor and minorities.

If the statement were simply a powerfully researched lament, it would serve an important purpose. A generation of Americans has been raised in a culture that portrays marriage as a private, emotional transaction between adults; a reminder of the public, social and moral responsibilities at stake is much needed.

The most useful part of the document is not its criticism, however, but its insistence that something can be done, its "Case Against Despair":

"The history of American progress is the history of confronting entrenched social problems once considered inevitable. Slavery, racism, poverty, pollution, drunk driving, domestic violence, sexism, tobacco use--in each case, Americans proved that when a social practice, big or small, is wrong or destructive, the correct response is not fatalistic acceptance, but action."

For married couples, the authors assert, that means finding support from people who believe in marriage. For parents, it means raising children to be successful in marriage, not just in careers.

For governments, it means promoting marriage as an explicit policy goal--treating it as a public health issue, utilizing welfare policy, subsidizing marriage education and adding more legal weight to the marriage vow.

There are also suggestions for counselors, medical professionals, lawyers, friends and family members. For religious leaders, there is this:

"Recover your historic role as custodians of the marriage covenant or sacrament. Deepen your own and your congregation's understanding of the importance of marriage as a sign and symbol of divine love," it suggests, with several additional paragraphs of specific ideas for doing that.

One can only hope the statement circulates at the Presbyterian assembly Friday. It may be the most original argument delegates hear all day, one that goes to the heart of the problem.